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Paul Beatty in conversation with Rick O’Shea

7th June 2017

Join us for a special evening with acclaimed author Paul Beatty as he chats to broadcaster Rick O’Shea about his latest novel The Sellout, which won the Man Booker Prize in 2016 on Wednesday 7th June in Dublin City Library & Archive, 138-144 Pearse St, Dublin 2.

Paul Beatty is the author of the novels Slumberland, Tuff, The White Boy Shuffle and The Sellout. He is also the author of two books of poetry, Big Bank Take Little BankandJoker, Joker, Deuce, and is the editor of Hokum: An Anthology of African-American Humor. He lives in New York City.

Rick O’Shea has been a broadcaster with national radio station RTE since 2001. He runs Ireland’s largest bookclub The Rick O’Shea Bookclub, and regularly conducts author interviews, panel discussions, award ceremonies and book launches.

‘The most badass first 100 pages of an American novel I’ve read.’ New York Times

A biting satire about a young man’s isolated upbringing and the race trial that sends him to the Supreme Court, The Sellout showcases a comic genius at the top of his game.

Born in Dickens on the southern outskirts of Los Angeles, the narrator of The Sellout spent his childhood as the subject in his father’s racially charged psychological studies. He is told that his father’s work will lead to a memoir that will solve their financial woes. But when his father is killed in a drive-by shooting, he discovers there never was a memoir. All that’s left is a bill for a drive-through funeral.

What’s more, Dickens has literally been wiped off the map to save California from further embarrassment. Fuelled by despair, the narrator sets out to right this wrong with the most outrageous action conceivable: reinstating slavery and segregating the local high school, which lands him in the Supreme Court.

In his trademark absurdist style, which has the uncanny ability to make readers want to both laugh and cry, The Sellout is an outrageous and outrageously entertaining indictment of our time